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Historic Board

Historic Board image
Parent Issue
Day
23
Month
September
Year
1897
Copyright
Public Domain
OCR Text

Surrounding the court houso in a county seat witWn a hundred miles of Springfield, Illinois, stood for many years a plain board fence. Beiore it finally disappeared to make way fo "park" improvements it had been re built at least twice. At each rebuüdlng, however, particular care was takín to leave a certain "top board" in exactly the position it had occupied before, not even a new nail-hole being made in it. A stranger, noticing one öay thi peouliarity in the fence, asked an ol Citizen who was leaning against a lo cust-tree and wiiktling a stick if ther was any explanation. "Did the county run out of money, he inquired, "when it had got t.his fenc all finished except one board?" "No, slr," replied the old citizen, putting his jack-knife in his pocket, walking to the fence, and laying his hand on it in a most impressive manner. "This top board is wuth more'n all the rest of the fence put together, old and rotted as it is. "Old Abe Lincoln made a speech in this court house yard in 1856, and when he was througli talklri' he saw ai old faimer in the crowd that he used to know when he was a boy, an' he eame down from the stand an' took that old feller out to the fecca an' talked over old times with him fur ten minutes or more, without payin' any attention to the Mg-bugs that was waitin' to take him off to dinner. And while he talkod to him, sir, he rested his right foot O'i this yere top board. I seen him do it, an' so did five hundred other men - an' that board haint never been dsturbed sence, an' haint never goin' to be!" Saying wnich, the old man walkei back to his position against the locusttree, took hls knife from his pocket again and resumed his whittling.

Article

Subjects
Old News
Ann Arbor Register